Va. lawmakers have valid point

The News Virginian / News Virginian
Published: March 28, 2008

State lawmakers hedged on a threat to withdraw from the No Child Left Behind program - and turn down $300 million in federal money, to boot - but their reasonable objections to the law have been heard nonetheless.

Led by Del. R. Steven Landes, R-Weyers Cave, lawmakers sought greater flexibility in the law, particularly with regard to students with special needs and those with limited English proficiency.

"It's not about a reluctance to be held accountable," state Superintendent of Public Instruction Billy K. Cannaday Jr. explained. "What it really is more about is reasonableness and fairness for youngsters who didn't have any control of how they got where they are."

Cannaday made those comments Wednesday to the Richmond Times-Dispatch after he and other state education and university officials and business leaders met with Education Secretary Margaret Spellings at the Science Museum of Virginia. Spellings vowed to seek changes, including providing greater nuance regarding schools falling far short of NCLB mandates and those on the cusp of meeting the law's standards.

In the meantime, state lawmakers have left it up to the state Board of Education to make the final call on whether to withdraw. With Gov. Timothy M. Kaine and board members aligned against that idea, a pullout is unlikely. We stand by our opposition to NCLB on the grounds that it puts too much control in the hands of feds rather than local school officials and parents.

The U.S. Department of Education has 4,500 employees and a $71.5 billion budget. There is nothing in the Constitution that says the federal government should be involved in public education, yet this bureaucracy was created at the end of the Carter administration, and has grown ever since. That $71.5 billion would go a long way toward assuring there are no children "left behind."

Particularly grating is the way in which the feds retain their stranglehold on local school systems, extortion by way of a threatened withdrawal of federal education money for states that refuse to play ball.

"I believe that when a state looks at … the $400 million in federal aid that they have gotten," Spellings said, "the kinds of results they're seeing in light of No Child Left Behind, that they would come to the conclusion that it's not in the interest of the kids in this state and fellow Virginians to walk away from those federal resources."

Assuredly, No Child has brought needed focus to improving the performance of schools in educating American children in the fundamentals. But we do not concur with the view that holds that such could only happen by way of a heavy federal hand. The law is emblematic of a philosophy that sees local communities as beholden to federal nanny overseers rather than capable of governing themselves. This is why we favor abolition of the measure.

In the absence of that step, we applaud state lawmakers for drawing greater attention to the law's flaws and the need at the very least for real and thoughtful reform. We look forward to Spellings and federal decision-makers with her following through on her promises of change. It is not the ideal solution, but it is a step in the right direction.